MOSCOW, January 30. /ITAR-TASS/. Head of Ukraine’s Federation of Employers Dmitry Firtash has urged to resume regular regime of exports of Ukrainian-made goods to Russia and warned about negative impacts of stricter customs control procedures.

“More complicated customs procedures tell negatively on both Ukrainian and Russian businesses,” Firtash said in a statement posted on the Federation’s official website on Thursday. “Russian companies will receive contracted products from Ukraine with big delays. So, it is in the interests of both countries’ businesses to resume the routine regime of importing Ukrainian goods to Russia.”

Meanwhile, Russia’s Federal Customs Service is still refraining from comments, neither confirming nor refuting reports about imposing tougher customs control procedures for Ukrainian imports. Earlier, spokeswoman for the central customs directorate Yekaterina Anchiporova told Itar-Tass that the changes in the customs procedures for imported goods had “not told on the time needed to cross the border.”

However, according to information available to Itar-Tass, a number of Russian and Ukrainian transport companies are having problems with transportation of cargos from Ukraine to Russia. The press service of the Ukrainian Association of International Commercial Trucking Companies told Itar-Tass that they were receiving relevant complaints from their member companies. “Trucks have no problems with crossing the border but after that they have to waste time at customs terminals inside Russia,” the press service said.

A source in the logistic company STS Logistic confirmed this information, saying that after crossing the border, trucks are directed to temporary storage facilities to check all cargoes from Ukraine. Certificates of origin are checked only at a territorial department in Moscow. Moreover, there are problems with transporting cargoes to Ukraine, too. “We have encountered problems with transporting cargoes to Ukraine, since truck heading for Ukraine are being stopped,” STS Logistics international shipment manager Ivan Golovko told Itar-Tass, adding that no comments were coming from the Russian Federal Customs Service.

A similar situation was reported in August 2013, when after Russia’s customs authorities enhanced control over Ukrainian imports, hundreds of trucks could not reach their destinations in Russia, being struck at the Russian-Ukrainian border. The situation normalized after these measures had been canceled.